So long, Rep. Barney Frank. How we’ll miss your cranky wit and withering insults. Adieu, Rep. Thad McCotter . Without you, there’ll be no more obscure Bob Dylan lyrics quoted on the House floor.
Congress has recently seen a massive drain of the eminently quotable characters who livened up the institution’s predictable pinstripes and talking points. But we’re hopeful that the 2012 elections might bring some replacements.
(Ed Andrieski/AP) - Joe Coors is a Republican running for a House seat in Colorado and a member of the famous brewing family.
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Here are just a few candidates running for House and Senate this cycle who, if elected (and we’re ignoring their odds for the moment), we’d nominate for the “Character Caucus”:
●Kerry Bentivolio, a Republican running for a House seat in Michigan. This might be the one guy who could make McCotter (whose old seat he’s seeking) seem ho-hum vanilla. Bentivolio’s a reindeer farmer and a part-time rent-a-Santa; he and his four-legged sidekicks are available for your holiday festivities. Of course, he appears shirtless, petting one of the critters, on his company’s Web site. Icing on the kooky cake: He’s a bit of a 9/11 conspiracy theorist and once appeared in a bizarre satire film on the subject.
●Joe Coors, a Republican running for a House seat in Colorado. Can we call him Joe Six-Pack? A member of the famous brewing family, he must be a huge hit at keg parties. And just think of the headline-writing possibilities.
●Alan Grayson, a Democratic former congressman seeking his old seat in Florida. He is a font of incendiary quotes. On GOP health-care proposals, he once said, “Republicans want you to die quickly if you get sick.” A lobbyist was a “K Street whore,” and he once opined that he had trouble listening to former vice president Dick Cheney “because of the blood that drips from his teeth.”
●Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat running for a House seat in Arizona. She’d be the first openly bisexual member of Congress. And she’s a hairstyle chameleon with as many do’s as Rihanna. Bangs, bobs, highlights — her political views might be firm, but her look sure isn’t.
●Danny Tarkanian, a Republican seeking a House seat in Nevada. He’s the son of legendary former UNLV basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian, though we don’t know whether he’ll adopt his dad’s signature sideline towel-chewing moves in Washington. Maybe during particularly nerve-racking votes?
●Mark Clayton, a Democrat running for Senate in Tennessee. Clayton’s association with tinfoil-hat conspiracy theories (NAFTA superhighway! FEMA prison camps!) has even Democrats distancing themselves from the floor installer they chose to face GOP Sen. Bob Corker.
●Linda McMahon, a Republican Senate candidate from Connecticut. She wasn’t just a desk jockey in the professional-wrestling empire she helped found with her family. She was often a part of the action in the ring. Career highlights include a performance in the 2001 epic “WrestleMania X-Seven,” in which she dealt a wicked groin kick to her husband, Vince .
●Joe Kennedy III, a Democrat running for the House in Massachusetts. Congress has been suffering a dearth of Kennedys since Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) declined to run for reelection in 2010. The storied political franchise may be back, and we hear that this scion, 31, has a catchy, ready-made sports-inspired nickname: JK3.
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